The Flickr Csxawpsubdivision Image Generatr

Pretty neat pair of EMD's for 2010 CSX shuffles around the yard areas in Montgomery on a spring afternoon. Looking sharp in the proper CSX scheme, the 8711 started out as one of the EMD demonstrator SD60s before moving on to Conrail as their 6842.

The cotton has long since been picked at Loachapoka as M602 works up the hill early on a winter morning.

Probably the biggest news on the local railroad scene in East Alabama in 2024 was the opening of the new CSX-CPKC interchange linking Montgomery and Meridian, Mississippi via the former Meridian & Bigbee. With the opening of the new gateway, Schneider National double-stacks from Mexico bound for Atlanta are now a daily sight on CSX trains L844/845. Business seems to be growing quickly as just a handful of well cars at the start has now become a pretty healthy cut most days like on this L845 rolling though downtown Opelika on a late December afternoon.

We still had at least 3 daily stack trains on the West Point Route back in 2010, and a colorful Q192 carrying steamship boxes rolls along the dirt road at Notasulga on this day 15 years ago. We're starting to get some stack traffic back off the new CPKC connection at Myrtlewood with boxes going to and from Mexico, but it hasn't grown into a dedicated train yet.

Shortly after the preceding A027 headed north, this train of crosstie gons got a clear out of the Opelika siding and is ducking under the 5th Street bridge as they head north for Atlanta. CSX was still big into road slugs back then, and the 2352 was just recently rebuilt a couple of years earlier from a former C&O GP40 as the last batch of their large fleet. Fast forward 15 years to the present day, and the slugs have fallen out of favor with only a handful remaining in service in 2025.

Also of note, I shot this on my first roll of Fuji Velvia 100 slide film. It was just a change-up at the time from my normal Kodak offerings, but didn't realize at the time it would become my regular film after Kodak killed off their slide film line in 2013 until E100 was revived in the fall of 2018.

How about a throwback to early April 15 years ago today to get the month started? Somehow on this flawless Friday morning I was playing hooky from my first real job in Montgomery and spent the day fanning around the local area, and it turns out it was a good day for it. CSX had two back-to-back work trains running north up the West Point Route, and both had ducked into the siding at Opelika to see a southbound by. With a fresh EC-1 in hand, A027 heads out with a train of track critters behind one of the former Conrail SD50s that was demoted to MofW service and renumbered into the 2400 series.

Spring has sprung at Notasulga with the Bradford Pears in full bloom on a dreary afternoon 15 years ago, as a work train with a solo SD50 ties down in the short siding.

Going back through the archives and scanning images from my early days of shooting slides there's a whole lot of "WTF?" compositions from those days; now I'd never take a pacing shot from the dark side but was pretty happy with how this one accidentally turned out when it landed on the light table. We did a lot of pacing trains back in college along Highway 14 between Auburn and Loachapoka, and on this dreary winter afternoon Frank S. Orona was handling the driving as Q612 is about to knock down the 121.4 with a battle-worn former L&N veteran on the point. This might be the only decent shot I have of that intermediate signal, as it was hard to take a "regular" train picture of being right up against a grade crossing. Back then the former Western Railway of Alabama was still run with track warrants and automatic block signals from West Point to Montgomery, and all of those old 1980s-era signals were replaced when CTC was installed in 2017.

It's always nice to find a surprise that had been totally forgotten about when going though older slides from the archives. Before they were traded to NS, I only ran across SD80MACs on CSX a handful of times and this was once that I had forgotten totally about until opening up a box to see which ones were scan-worthy jogged the memory. A couple of days prior I had seen this pair lead a Q619 south to New Orleans with the 70 leading, and took the camera along with me to work in Montgomery for a couple of days on the chance that the power set would get put on a northbound headed back the same direction. Sure enough, two days later on my lunch break heard this Q602 getting a warrant to head north up the West Point Route so made a quick run over to Michigan Avenue to grab a shot as they throttled up departing Chester Yard 15 years ago today.

Back then Q602 was taking the "long way" from New Orleans to Waycross via Montgomery and Manchester instead of the usual routing across the Florida Panhandle via Pensacola and Tallahassee; probably due to maintenance of way curfews. Of course now this is the usual daily routing for all the New Orleans to Waycross traffic after the Panhandle Line was sold off during the Hunter Purges in 2018.

Three different flavors of CSX Dash 8s led by a former Conrail (with original CSX wide and standard cabs trailing) leads a rock train north a Chehaw back in February of 2010. Thankfully the 136 milepost has gotten a little more professional lettering done sometime over the last 15 years haha.

Not many front-coupled, on-the-fly roster slides are going to make the queue for scanning but this was a worthy exception. On this day back in 2010 the 8954 was the last SD45-2 still in active service on CSX, and it was running out its last miles in maintenance of way service here trailing on a train of track critters bound for Mobile. Not long afterwards it was retired to the REDI Training Center at Tilford Yard in Atlanta, and spent several years there as a training unit for new hires and picked up a new coat of paint in along the way. Thankfully when it was retired for good the former Seaboard Coast Line 2049 found a good home, and is now preserved at the Southeastern Railway Museum in Duluth, Georgia.

A quick look back on this day 15 years ago finds a short Atlanta to Montgomery L611 tied down in the siding at Opelika waiting for a fresh crew with a sharp pair of AC60s. This was a good weekend with JLS in town visiting from Louisville, with plenty of interesting trains running, good weather, and good company to boot.

A Mac has the daily Montgomery to Atlanta manifest rolling at a good clip through Cusseta on the old Western Railway of Alabama. This train has cycled through quite a few symbols over the last 25 years; from Q610 to Q600 and then back to Q610 again for a short time before several years as M526 to now running as L844.

One of CSX's Huntington Shop Mac rebuilds leads Montgomery to Atlanta manifest L844 north up the hill at Loachapoka on a nice fall morning. Must be some issue going on with the 4541's ditchlights, with those portable magnetic-mount ones attached to the pilot and plugged in.

Not exactly the normal scheme you'd expect on a CSX unit, right? As part of the Conrail split NS inherited 18 B40-8s which were somewhat oddballs on the NS roster, and when they were done with them CSX quickly scooped up the group to add to their decently-sized group in local service. About 3 years after moving over to CSX, the former Conrail 5072 was tied down for local service at Fairburn on the south side of Atlanta. After getting sold off during the Hunter purges, 5968 found it's way to PanAm so if it's still running it's a CSX unit for a second time now.

Had a thought today that one thing that has really changed here on the West Point Route in the last few years is how run-thru foreign power has become almost nonexistent in the years since the PSR virus swept through the railroad industry like wildfire. After moving to Auburn in 2003 and at least through 2015 or so, there were times where it would be hard to tell that this was a CSX line given all the UP power on trains from the New Orleans interchange bound for Atlanta, Hamlet, and Waycross. Here on a February morning in 2010, a pair of SD70Ms with the leader being one of the 25 former SP units put on a good show dragging Q606 up the hill and out of Opelika. Q606 bound for Waycross wasn't one of our regular trains back then but it showed up occasionally when trackwork was happening on the panhandle line, however now it is routed through here after that more direct route from New Orleans to south Georgia was shortlined and sold off several years ago.

In addition to western run-through power getting much more uncommon on the New Orleans to Atlanta CSX corridor in recent years, what was once 4 daily stack trains dwindled and then disappeared entirely in 2017. On a spring morning back in 2010, a well-powered Q145 has a new crew on board and starts across North Court street on their way out of Montgomery. Stack traffic has started to come back to the old Western Railway of Alabama in recent months though, as the CSX/CPKC purchase of the Meridian & Bigbee has opened up a new interchange route for Mexico stacks bound for Atlanta.

We're snowed in here in Auburn, and the roads are an absolute icy disaster so sure not going out to try to get some snow pics till maybe later. So how about a throwback to another rare deep south snow storm 15 years ago? We had a pretty good snow back in February 2010 and late in the afternoon a work train bangs across the diamond in downtown Opelika with a GP40-2/slug set for power. In current times the woodchip business from Lee's Timber in Opelika has dried up and those old signals at the interlocking are long gone, but the West Point Route coaling tower is still standing strong.

For being such a slow film, Kodachorme 64 did pretty well with this one given that it was getting damn near sunset on that cold winter afternoon.

A warm glow lights everything up with a golden hue as a work train heads south at Notasugla just minutes before sunset on a March afternoon back in 2010. Can't remember for sure, but this very likely may have been the last time I shot a YN1 CSX unit as there weren't many left at all by this time 15 years ago. Given how the remaining YN2 AC4400s have started being a foam attraction of late, sure this 8418 would cause quite the stir if it was still running around painted like this.

Speaking of things that are no longer around, I always liked this spot for afternoon southbounds coming under the Alabama Highway 81 overpass. But no chance to get it today as starting around 2012 or so the brush growth turned it into a forest here in short order.

An empty Herzog rock train backs across Alabama Highway 14 and into the then-new Vulcan Materials Loachapoka quarry as good friend Frank S. Orona gets his shot from the retaining wall. Also of note to date how long ago this spring afternoon in 2009 was is that only the quarry lead comes off the mainline here. Construction of the new 12,000-foot Loackapoka siding wouldn't being for about another year, and trains heading to the quarry have to enter from the siding.